Hi Hey there!,
Wow, January went for ages, didn't it? Luckily, the arrival of this newsletter into your inbox means the end of the month! Today I want to talk about something that I've seen discussed a lot recently: Eco-guilt. From the makers of Eco-anxiety, I presume.
A recent Vogue article unpacked this fun new variety of guilt and articulated something I think all of us feel from time to time — feeling bad about buying single-use plastics, guilt over a takeaway coffee cup or regret about spontaneously buying a piece of clothing you'll probably never wear.
I wrote about eco-guilt in an Instagram post recently, quoting the wonderful author and climate activist Naomi Klein when she said:
"The world would have already had to change in order for you to be a non-hypocritical activist.”
How can we expect perfection from ourselves — or anyone else — when we're operating in a fundamentally imperfect system? If we're always striving for perfection, we're setting ourselves up for failure (and probably an early guilt-induced grave.)
Eco-guilt also makes us feel that we as consumer citizens are responsible for fixing the climate crisis through changing our lifestyle habits, when we ought to remember that it's corporations who have the most power to bring about widescale environmental change. They just aren't doing it fast enough.
So when it comes to eco-guilt, my thoughts are: just do your best. Make small, realistic changes and don't forget who is really to blame for the climate crisis (it's not you.)
I'd love to hear your feedback or thoughts! Hit reply to this email to say hello.
Meg x
